Quick definitions: “Traffic” means readers coming to your blog – the more, the better!
A “backlink” is a link from another site, pointing to your site. It might go to your homepage, to another page, or to a specific blog post.
There are some ways to get traffic which might work in the short-term, but get you penalised long-term. If you try to get traffic to your blog by dubious methods, Google will sooner or later crack down and you’ll find your traffic gone.
Instead of seeking quick fixes, you want look for long-term solutions that not only bring you traffic but make the web a better place for everyone.
All these tips are ones that you can do right from day one … but they’ll also help you out if you’ve been blogging for years and struggling to get traffic.
#1: Write Content That People Want to Read and Link To
Before you put any other traffic-generation tips into practice, you need to make sure your content is as good as it can be.
To get traffic, you need to have content people want to read. It needs to be:
- Useful or entertaining (or both!)
- Well-written
- Nicely formatted for easy reading
When other people link to your content – with no prompting from you – then you’ll know you’ve got it right. These links are also really valuable, as Google views them as natural and trustworthy.
Go further: It’s OK to occasionally ask someone for a link, but only do this for your very best posts. Don’t ask the same people all the time – and don’t target top A-list bloggers when you’re just starting out.
#2: Use Social Media
If you aren’t already on Twitter or Facebook, get started with one of them.
You don’t need to be on every network out there: focus on one or two that you’re comfortable with, and that are a good fit for your audience.(If you’ve got a business-focused blog, for instance, you might find your readers are more likely to hang out on LinkedIn.)
As well as getting traffic from links shared on social media, you’ll get new followers, plus some bloggers will use links they’ve tweeted as the basis of a weekly round-up of their niche.
#3: Leave Comments on Other Blogs
In the early weeks and months of blogging, leaving comments on other people’s blogs is a great way to get some extra traffic. You might only get a handful of visitors from a comment – but if you leave five comments every day, this will soon add up.
Make sure your comments add value to the conversation, and use your real name (or pseudonym) not a keyword.
Go further: Reply to other readers’ comments and questions, rather than just adding your own thoughts. This is a great way to connect with them as well as with the blogger.
#4: Be Generous in Linking Out
How often do you link to other bloggers? If it’s rarely – or never – then you’re not giving them much reason to link to you.
By being generous with your links, you’ll often find that a blogger will return the favour. You may also be able to strike up a relationship them, potentially helping one another out in other ways too.
Go further: Link to other bloggers in your guest posts (see #6); if they receive a link from a high-profile blog as a result, they’ll definitely be grateful.
#5: Use Your Email Signature
Email signatures are often overlooked as a source of traffic. Look at it this way: you probably send multiple emails every day, and some of those will be to people who don’t know about your blog (or who haven’t visited it in a while).
Include a link to your blog in your signature – perhaps with your tagline, or a few words describing what your blog is about.
Go further: Do the same with your signature on any forums you belong to, if this is allowed.
#6: Write Guest Posts for Other Blogs
Guest posting is a great way to grow your blog fast. It gets your writing in front of a new (and usually much bigger) audience, and you’ll have a short bio at the end of your post to link to your blog, or a post on it.
You’ll get traffic directly from your guest post, but the link itself is valuable too and will help your blog rank more highly in search engines.
Google regularly cracks down on low-quality links, however, so make sure you’re only guest posting on high-quality, reputable sites.
Go further: List the top five sites in your niche that you want to guest post for, and study them carefully to find out what types of post they publish.
Further reading:
Want more help with traffic? These posts are all full of excellent advice and ideas:
Beginners: How to Promote Your Blog and Get More Visitors / Traffic (Mike Wallagher, Start Blogging Online)
Intermediate: How to Get More Traffic to Your Blog and Keep It There (Jeff Goins, Jeff Goins Writer)
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